It is a long time since St. Mary's had seven bridesmaids waiting for their bride! At midday on Saturday, the bells rang out cheerfully above the cold wind and drizzle, for the wedding of Vicky, eldest daughter of Jim and Carolyne Simpson of Mermaid Street, and Simon Perks of London. Vicky looked lovely in a stylish white dress with big shoulders and a draped skirt, and a delicate floral coronet; she carried a creamy bouquet. Chief bridesmaid was her sister Cindy, while two flatmates, her younger sister Abigail and a matching cousin, and Simon's two very small god-daughters made up the seven; the best man was the father of one of the little girls, which may have contributed to their immaculate behaviour. All the bridesmaids were in white, with pink or blue sashes, and carried heart-shaped circlets of mixed flowers. The bride's mother was elegantly dressed in cerise and black. The bridal flowers were by Susan Manktelow, and the Flower Guild members arranged those in the church. The service was taken by the bride's uncle (and godfather) and Canon Maundrell; Charles Proctor at the organ was supported by a five-piece brass ensemble, and the St. Mary's choir mustered almost its full strength despite the loss of the bride's father and sister t o the wedding group. There was a reception for 120 guests at the Mermaid. The honeymoon is being spent in Kenya, with some deep-sea fishing for Simon; his other hobby is golf, so Rye will doubtless be seeingsomething of Mr. and Mrs. Perks before long. They will be living in London, in Wetherby Gardens; Vicky works for British-American Tobacco, and Simon is a paper broker.
One of the prettiest sights was the two tiny bridesmaids, wrapped in white shawls, being carried by their very smart mammas up Mermaid Street so that their white satin ballet slippers shouldn't meet disaster on the cobbles!
Sixty years ago today, Dorothy and Fred Oliver were married in Westfield Church. Mr. Oliver's family came to Rye before WW1; he started work for Burnhams when he left school in 1919, and apart from wartime service with the Royal Marines has lived here more or less ever since. Mrs. Oliver had worked as a cook; when she was 50, with her five children off her hands, she went over to Lewes to take a City & Guilds course in canteen management, and after a spell in the New Road school kitchen she was canteen manageress at Farnborough Engineering. The family lived out along Military Road, and then in Bridge Place; now Mr. and Mrs. Oliver are just round the corner in Fishmarket Road.
Their sons Alan and Peter live in Rye, and their daughter Doreen in Icklesham; another son recently moved to Norfolk, and the one who lives in Wolverhampton is hardly ever there because he travels all over the world for his firm.
There are ten grandchildren and seven great-grand-children. Mrs. Oliver has not been in very good health lately, but hopes to get out more before too long; she is deeply grateful to Doreen, and her daughters-in-law Kay and Janet, for all they do for her. We offer the GAZETTE's heartiest congratulations on this splendid occasion, and wish Mr. and Mrs. Oliver a very happy day.
This Saturday sees the 45th wedding anniversary of Bill and Lil Westley of Cyprus Place. Married at Rye Baptist Church in 1942, they met when Mr. Westley, who had been a regular soldier with the Ox. & Bucks. L.I. before the war, was stationed at Stone with the 1st Airborne Division; Mrs. Westley was then Lil Hyder, of South Undercliff. After the war they tried living in his home town of Coventry, but decided to come back to Rye, and were among the first tenants in Marley Road when the Estate was built. After a period with Rother Iron Works, Mr. Westley worked for 38 years in the railway workshops at Ashford. They have three daughters living locally, 7 grandchildren and a great-granddaughter. Congratulations and good wishes for many happy years ahead!
2.
It is perhaps rather hard on the RDA, as viewed from Rye, that the very first item in its 1987/8 Work Programme is the footbridge in Harbour Road ("the first stage of the improvements is completed, and the land in Harbour Road has been unlocked for industrial development"!) This was installed just in time for the official visit by the Chairman of the Development Commission in April 1986; there was no access to it then - and there is no access to it now. Agreed, a planning application for the Tollgate Garage site added to the complications, but nothing further seems to have happened over that and it begins to look likely that the nice bridge beside the lock will still be a white elephant a full year after it was swung into place across the Brede early one morning last spring!
Other oddities in the list are projects which had been under way, on paper anyhow, before the RDA's birth was announced. These include Rother's sheltered housing scheme for the Magdala House site (project no. 60), as well as the new fire station (project no. 39). The disabled loo at Strand Quay also appears,as a new project (no. 62); Rother had the work done some months ago, in fact, but the list was prepared by KCC who obviously didn't know this.
Of the more tangible projects affecting Rye itself (much of the programme only relates to Kent), the question of a Heritage Centre is the most interesting. A lot of people have been wondering just what such a Centre would be. Ours would undoubtedly have as its centrepiece the Town Model (making the Town Council's contribution to the project); although everyone is grateful to Alsfords for the use of their building, a street-level (and larger) home would be a great advantage. There would also be an opportunity for local artist-craftsmen to display their work (and perhaps also to sell it?), and almost certainly some tourist information provision, perhaps relieving the summer pressure on the overcrowded Cinque Ports Street office. This is a new project (no. 85) and the idea is "to renovate a warehouse on Strand Quay as a tourist attraction - the building itself constituting part of the attraction". But which warehouse? The obvious candidate is the one behind the Garden Shop, part of which is already owned by Rother and which is in a very bad state of repair; but there are other possibilities, the whole idea is still at a very early stage, and nothing is likely to happen immediately. But when the RDA comes to an end, having done its best with jobs, housing and transport throughout the area, the Heritage Centre could well become its memorial here.
Other Rye projects include a wharfage feasibility study (no. 82) costing 010,000, to follow the marina study now completed (see page 5); and a new tourist guide for Rye (no. 33) on the lines of the Battle guide, to be produced by ESCC for the 1988/9 season. There is also the whole-area Small Projects Budget, whose £2,500 funding has already helped three playgroups and a group for disabled people (Leslie Bulman is the person to ask about this). A new scheme (no. 83) for improving "the unkempt and dilapidated appearance of Harbour Road" by planting trees there sounds interesting; the difficult part is usually keeping them growing thereafter - but Mr. Bulman says that experts from Kew Gardens would be advising, if this one comes off.
Rye Scouts and Cubs said thank-you to Peter Dee of Udimore Road last week, when he was presented with a Thanks Badge - a rare honour - for the ten years he has spent as the Group Scout Leader; there was also a bouquet for his wife Sheila ("in memory of thousands of cups of tea, and a few other things"). Although Peter is retiring from active service in the Scout movement, he won't be losing interest entirely - which is good news for the Rye troop. This meets on Thursdays from 7.15 to 9; Leader is Frank Dowdeswell, and his wife Zeta and Francis Rowe are assistant leaders. The Cub Leader is John West, with Simon Bowler, Janet Balcombe and Chris Emson as his assistants; the 30 Cubs (there is a waiting list) meet on Tuesdays from 6.30 to 8. Five Cubs have gone up to Scouts: Jonathan Emson, Michael Hookey, Simon Rice, James Boreham and Nicholas Robus.
3 THE RYE GAZETTE, 18 February 1987
... to Mrs. Monica Oliver, unanimously re-elected by the Town Council on Monday evening as Mayor of Rye for the coming year.
A reader whose train from London missed the Rye connection was very surprised to be told by the Traffic Manager at Ashford that BR no longer hold connections for Rye "because due to the electrification of the Hasting-London line most people from Rye preferred to catch a connection at Hastings". Do they really, she asks? - because the timetabled journey takes 24 minutes longer via Hastings!
We were surprised, too, and asked the Area Manager what the position is. It is exactly the same as before, he told us, and perhaps our reader misunderstood what she was told: main line trains are not held, but branch line connections wait for up to five minutes when there is not another for at least an hour.
Mr. Holt has also heard from a passenger unable to phone for a lift because the Station Approach box was out of order (even if you rarely use a call-box, an emergency £1 phone-card is useful to have). In these circumstances, the Rye booking-clerk will make a call for a stranded passenger as soon as he has time (the passenger pays for the call) though passengers can't use the office phone.
When the final details of the supermarket plans were approved (they are dated October 1985), it was made clear that the four brick pillars at the entrance to Station Approach were to remain, though the one on the outer edge of the pavement on the pub side would be demolished and eventually rebuilt on the far side of the Market entrance. With our listed Station building, Rother appreciates the importance of Station Approach to the look of the town - it is not just any old road junction.
When the permitted pillar was demolished last week, John Ciccone was surprised to be told by one of the workmen that its mate was due to go too. The foreman assured us that this was right, they were demolishing both pillars - for keeps. We appealed to Rother, who very promptly contacted the builders; it turned out that the foreman was working from an earlier plan! So the second pillar should be safe now - but it is worth everyone keeping an eye on what goes on.
The contractors have certainly improved what was, last week, a very nasty hazard for pedestrians; the pavement on the station side of Ferry Road had been blocked off completely, so that walkers had either to use the other side and risk the nasty crossing at the top, or take their lives (and those of their push-chair children) in their hands and walk in the lorry-ridden road. Now there is a rough but perfectly usable surface on the new pavement, and noobstruction. Thanks!
Leah Mercedes at The Linen Press, the tiny High Street shop next door to the Woolwich, has been off on a buying trip. Quite a few of our more enterprising shopkeepers do this, travelling all over the country. However, we doubt if anyone else has gone quite as far as Leah, after just eight months in business she came home last week, with a fair amount of excess baggage, from Thailand, Hong Kong and China! Since the shop is so very small, she will never find room to display the fascinating collection of unashamedly modern household linen she discovered. From Northern Thailand come elaborately patchworked counterpanes in pure silk, single or double size, which would also make superb wall hangings; from mainland China, handmade copies of Victorian tape lace, table-cloths and napkins, cushion covers and counterpanes, indistinguishable from the originals except that they are less frail and about half the price! She also has hand- embroidered handkerchiefs, and a whole rainbow of plain Thai silk cushion-covers from which anyone could match existing curtains or covers. These beautiful things don't come cheap - though they come a lot more expensive in London, Leah has noticed - but they would make the most enviable wedding or anniversary present for some lucky lady. And we do congratulate Leah on her enterprise in going so far for such a rich cargo.
4.
Both Rother and the Town Clerk have explained the reasons why the Rye parish rate is so much higher than last year. The Special Expenses charged by Rother (of which Rye only pays specifically 20%) are up primarily because of increased expenditure on our various open spaces - though the extra groundsman is riot counted as a Rye special expense. There is also to be a considerable outlay on the Ypres Tower, where there is still trouble with water getting in; the recently approved tender is for a little under 010,000, and more will need to be spent later quite apart from the annual maintenance.
Lesley Scammell at the Town Hall is still trying to build up a comforting contingency cushion against future problems - notably the Town Hall roof. (The cupola is now finished, with the scaffolding due to come down any day, and all is now well with it; it certainly looks very handsome, and Burnhams had dry weather just when they needed it for the final painting.) The Town Hall cottage was never redecorated before Gus Gale moved in, and it certainly needs it now; rot in the cellar also had to be dealt with. Lesley has mostly kept regular expenses at last year's level; photocopier expenses have been greater, but Councillors have been kept much better informed since its arrival. The other major expense is likely to be the Freda Gardham Field, which the Council is trying to make more attractive to prospective hirers (the Country Fair will be held there this year); fencing, tree-planting and water all cot. money, but if enough rent can be earned to offset the 0900 ESCC will charge tar mowing it this summer, the Council will be well satisfied.
Despite extra expenses, Rother is keeping its own rate down to last year's figure of 20.4p - a very small proportion of the total, most of which goes to ESCC. Rother are not cutting services, but benefiting from careful housekeeping - including a successful investment policy (millions of pounds pass through its bank account!) and an increasing amount of bulk buying.
Five ex-TPS pupils did very well at the White Rock last week, when Hastings College Beauty Studies Department held its annual competitions and made awards for last year's work. The winner of the L'Oreal Cup for Ladies' Fashion Styling is Gavin Harwin, of Udimore Road; he is already working part-time at the Simon Harris salon in the High Street, whose customers will be particularly pleased at his success. Karen Regendanz of Iden was runner-up to Gavin, and Lisa Horsman of Camber came second for the men's styling trophy. All three will complete their hairdressing course in the summer. A year ahead are Nicola Trill (now of Camber) and Sarah Barclay of Love Lane, who finished their hairdressing studies last year and are now on the one-year beauty-care course. Sarah was awarded the Goldwell Trophy for the most outstanding hairdressing student, and Nicola gained the Professional Trophy for achievement in hairdressing and beauty. Congratulations all round!
Rother's Policy & Resources Committee last week considered the question of subsidised concessionary bus passes. When ESCC introduced the scheme last autumn, Rother had no money in the current year's budget to subsidise the passes at all, and only very few were sold at the full rate of £22. For the 1987/8 budget, the Treasurer has made enquiries from other East Sussex Councils about what they do. Students get a discount only in Eastbourne; the blind get free passes in Brighton, Eastbourne and Hove, and in Brighton the elderly and disabled also travel free. Rather is at present the only District which offers no concessions at all. The resolution before the special budget meeting of the Council at the end of this month will propose that £10,000 be set aside for the concessionary fares scheme, with subsidised passes for the elderly, blind, registered partially-sighted and those with walking difficulty. The subsidy would be £10, making the present price of the pass £12. More details later, if Council approves the recommendation.
Rother is also going to employ a Dog Warden; more about this next week.
5.
A year ago, we offered subscribers a standing-order facility, and more than a third of you took advantage of it. You filled in a simple form and returned it to us, and now on 30 March and 30 September each year your bank automatically pays £7 into ours; you don't get a receipt, but your bank statement witnesses that the payment has been made.
All subscriptions fall due at the end of March. If any other subscribers would like to pay this way, we will gladly enclose a form (from 4 March, to be returned to us by 20 March, please). We mention this now to give you time to think about it; details of subscription renewals for cash/cheque payers will appear on 11 March.
(readers might care to go through this lot with their diaries?)
Anyone taking any interest in the Marina Feasibility Study, to which we have referred from time to time over the past few months, will be glad to know that on Friday 6 March (10 to 4), and from 10 to 1 on the Saturday, the consultants' report and a small display will be on view to the public at the Saltings Hotel. Earlier in the week there is a presentation by LRDC Inter- national for invited guests and the press, and we shall be reporting on this in our 11 March issue; but to see for yourself is better still.
Those interested in the appeal by the owners of Frenchman's Beach against Rother's refusal to allow them 30 more caravans at the Harbour site, may like to look in on the Public Enquiry, at the Town Hall on Thursday and Friday, 12 and 13 March, from 10. (Since this is not a Rye matter, it won't appear in the diary for that week.)
The Health Promotion Unit in Hastings is holding another Save-a-Life session at the Clinic from 7 to 9 on Thursday, 12 March. A tutor from the East Sussex Ambulance Service will be giving instruction in emergency resuscitation; bookings (£2) in advance to Hastings 441933. People from the villages who missed the Peasmarsh and Brede classes are, of course, welcomed to this one.
TPS parents will be getting letters about the Careers Convention to be held at Upper School on Thursday evening, 19 March. This is not aimed only at sixth-formers, but also at the third-year pupils who will soon be choosing their GCSE options, and the fifth-years who may or may not decide to leave in the summer. The invitation from the school is to parents and pupils, but we understand that others interested will be welcome. More employers than ever will be represented, with stands overflowing the Hall into the corridor.
There are still some tickets left (£10.50) for the RNLI public dinner at the George Hotel on Friday, 20 March. As well as an excellent meal, with wine, the price includes an entertainment by Jan Reeve and her accompanist. Tickets from Joan Parkes.
AGMs: the WI Market hold theirs at 2 on 6 March (speaker is Mrs. Stocks, with a talk intriguingly entitled "A Washing-up Bowl"!); the Conservative Association also have theirs on 6 March, at 7.30 with Ken Warren as guest of honour. The NSPCC's is on (unusually) a Tuesday, 17 March at 3; speaker is the Appeals Director of the Society, Giles Pegram.
Freda Gardham School PTA are holding an Open Forum on 18 March; we shall have more about this nearer the time, but keep the date, parents of younger chil dren (invitations are going to Tilling Green and Rye Playgroup too). TPS PTA has a Model Exhibition at the Upper School on 28 March. Also on 28 March is another exhibition, the WI Group Craft Show, held as usual at the FE Centre.
Fund-raising events: the Pancake Race (for the Community Centre) on 3 March, the next jumble sale (Cadborough Jubilee Social Club) on 21 March; Women's BL events on 7 and 14 March; TPS PTA Barn Dance (Catsfield Steamers) on 7 March; ARC Ploughman's Lunch on the 24th, and the Mencap Spring Sale on the 28th in the morning.
Details of all these will appear in the weekly diary in due course.
6.
Good news from The Grove, where the Sports Centre is finished inside and out and was, last week, simply waiting for the equipment to arrive. The brochure setting out all the facilities and what they cost, plus details of the (very nominal) membership fees, will be available soon, and we will give the figures then; but when the Centre opens for business, the first week will be free, to encourage everyone to come and see for themselves. The official opening is to be on Easter Monday (20 April), but the manager Timothy Lees (who is now living up at Leasam House) hopes to welcome his first customers before the end of March.
The building looks enormous from the outside; from the inside, oddly, it looks even more enormous. There is one entrance, from the school side, with the office/pay-desk beside it; carpeted stairs (and a wheelchair lift) lead up to the bar area, with a viewing window over the main hall and a glimpse into the squash court - only a glimpse at present, but this is something they hope to improve later. Customers thinking of using the fitness room, with its dozen or so pieces of equipment, will be relieved to know that there are no viewing facilities at all for that!
The fitness room, squash court and main hall are the full height of the Centre; the fitness room could become a second squash court, or indeed vice versa, depending on how the demand works out. (Colin Hudson of Rother made the point that they are anxious not to take away trade from the Military Road squash club; the court in The Grove is intended for casual visitors or for people who would like to try the game before becoming involved with a club, and equipment will be available for hire.)
The main hall, 32m x 17m, is vast and echoing, and the floor (made from specially-treated and sealed compressed-wood blocks) is marked out in different colours for half-a-dozen different games. Sliding nets can divide it across the middle, and/or screen off one long side for cricket practice; or the whole area can be used for a single game of five-a-side football or indoor hockey. We shall be able to go into more detail about the sporting options when the brochure is published.
Inside the Centre the cloakrooms consist simply of two showers and one loo for each sex, plus a wheelchair loo. But Colin Hudson points out that the very adequate TPS gym cloakroom facilities just across the path (which can be locked off from the rest of the school premises) will be available as well, out of school hours, and they hope eventually to have a covered way from them to the Centre. Cars will park on the school car-park, unused out of school hours; patrons on foot can use the hand-gate in The Grove, or walk round via Tillingham Avenue (now that Lower School is so firmly fortified).
The whole complex will be used by the school until 5.30 pm on schooldays. Thereafter until 11 pm, and at weekends and in the holidays, the rest of us can enjoy it - either as individuals, or as members of the various groups which Colin Hudson hopes will form when they see what is available. One minor snag is that the drinks licence states firmly that when the bar is open, under-14s shall not be allowed in the bar area - and the bar area is the only place to sit, so parents bringing along younger children because they can't leave them at home may have to think again (or restrict their visits to times when the bar is shut). Since the catering is expected to be a money-maker for the Centre, it would be nice to see - eventually - an area where families can buy coffee and soft drinks, during the day or in the early evening.
Rother has paid for the whole building - about £350,000, less a grant of £50,000 from the Sports Council. If George Shackleton had not led the opposition to a very expensive swimming pool for Bexhill, it seems unlikely that we would have our Centre now. Later, when ESCC pulled out financially from its original suggestion for an enlarged school gym - offering only the site and the school's share of the maintenance - we looked like losing it again. All credit to Rother for this very handsome addition to the facilities of the town; now it is up to the town to make good use of it.
7.
• This year sees the 30th anniversary of the Women's World Day of Prayer in Rye. The first service was held on 8 March 1957 in the Baptist Church, with about 70 women representing all the churches in Rye. Ruth Ingham would be very glad to hear from those of the 70 who still live here and would like to come to this year's service, in St. Mary's at 2.30 on Friday, 7 March; they would be very welcome participants. The speaker will be Mrs. Sue Marriott, of Ashburnham. Any of the 70 who would like to come but has no transport, please say so; anyone who can offer help with transport could perhaps say so too? Messages may be left at River Books in Lion Street.
• An interested audience turned up at Freight Express on Thursday evening to help Glenis Bentley launch her new Action for Epilepsy Group, and to see an instructive (though perhaps not strictly enjoyable!) video made at the Chalfont Centre and explaining the different kinds of epileptic fit. This video was made for professionals, and would have been very helpful to teachers who may not often have encountered epilepsy - it was a pity that no-one from Thomas Peacocke or Freda Gardham was there, but perhaps there could be a second chance to see it? Those who would like to join the Group should contact Mrs. Bentley; the next meeting is on 12 March. For everyone, there is a coffee morning at the Red Cross on 4 April, with the usual stalls.
Radio 2 listeners who tune into the concert from Hastings at 7.30 on Saturday evening might like to make the cocoa before or after the programme instead of during the interval, since the "filler" (while the audience at the White Rock is propping up the bar) is a walk round Rye with Michael Meech - a walk taken three weeks ago. Hearing that the song "There's an old-fashioned house..." was inspired by Robin Hill in Mermaid Street (though its name was different then), Michael has found a recording of it, and those of us who never knew more than the first two lines will at last be able to hear it right through (in the interval programme and not the actual concert).
• The January newsletter from Rye Mencap includes a very big thank-you to Vickie Piper for what she has done for the Society in its first 24 years. Vickie has stood down as chairman so that she can give more time to the embryo horticultural project due to start this year, but she is continuing as the group's secretary. The new chairman is Daphne Hughes, newly retired from Social Services; vice-chairman is Sally Watson of Peasmarsh, and Harold Pearce continues as treasurer. The next Mencap event is the Spring Sale and coffee morning at the Red Cross on 28 March.
The group hopes to take the children away again on holiday this year; if anyone has a large house they could lend for a week, says Miss Hughes optimistically, they would love to hear about it!
• After several people had remarked, not very favourably, on the new fence which Rother has erected alongside the Salts, we asked Colin Hudson about it. The problem was, he said, that the concrete posts were disintegrating so badly that the reinforcing rods were protruding, to the public danger; and it was not possible to replace the posts without replacing the rail too, because the present one was corroded into one long immovable length. Mr. Hudson took the decision to use timber this time because it is so much easier to replace, if part of the fence comes to grief - and it looks nice too. His Department has also replaced, with a roll of split-chestnut fencing, the posts and wire which have been gently decaying for years at the corner of Gibbet Marsh and Ashenden Avenue.
• We were right both times about the Bray residence. Before moving to Rovindene, Sir Hugh and Lady Bray lived at Saltcote for three years - presumably as tenants of the Hennessys, who had other homes here and abroad. Our correspondent has checked with a friend, the son of the Brays' chauffeur; the family lived in the flat over the Saltcote stables - and the Rolls, of course, lived underneath. (Our correspondent remembers the occasion when his friend's father gave him a lift up Rye Hill in it - what an excitement for a small boy then!)
Thrift Shop, Red Cross, 10 to 4 (and FRIDAY and SATURDAY) Blood donor sessions (please come early, says the card), Baptist Hall, 2 to 4 and 5 to 7.45
National Trust members' evening, slides from volunteers, CC, 7.30 (transferred from Winchelsea)
Thomas Peacocke School closed (for in-service training)
Half-term week begins
Town Council committees, Town Hall
St. Michael's Hospice Appeal coffee morning (with a speaker at 11) upstairs at CC, 10.30
Rye Lions presentation to Guide Dogs for the Blind Fund, George Hotel, 7 for 7.30 (GAZETTE no. 211)
• Congratulations to Woolworths on the cheerful display in their small window - now once more clear glass. The pegboard backing the interior display case is covered with seed packets, more form an ingenious pyramid, and there is a selection of the tools needed to grow them. Thank you very much, Mr. Wren, for reminding us all that summer is on the way!
• Rye WI's sponsored knit-in has resulted in a cheque for £133 for the Hospice, which was presented at the February meeting "In a pardonable glow of self-approval" says Jeanne Freeman, they then sat back and enjoyed Rachel Sarrieddine's charming and witty talk on her family fascinating genealogical dolls' house.
• TPS Vlth-former Lynda Davis, a boarder at Leasam House, has won a prize from the Federation of Business and Professional Women in Hastings for the girl who has made the most promising progress in computer studies.
• At a ceremony at RESH last Thursday, Frank May of Rye & Rother Valley Round Table made a presentation to the hospital in memory of Victor Wear, one of the Table's founder members. Dr. Andrew Leach was delighted to receive a piece of equipment costing some L400 - with a very long name, but in effect a resuscitation unit for babies and small children - paid for by money raised among the Tablers.
• Winners of this year's TPS cross-country event, which includes runners from every year in the school, was Rother House.
• George Cumming, chairman of the local branch of the Multiple Sclerosis Society gratefully acknowledges the proceeds of the TPS Lower School "Discover-Read" exercise held recently. Around L340 was raised by first- and second-year pupils from parents and friends sponsoring on the basis of so much per book read over a given period. MSS has also benefited from about £700 profit from the very popular Christmas card devised by Eileen Jenkins, and will also gain from the generosity of sponsors for George Cumming in the London Marathon.
• Is there any kind person travelling regularly from Rye to Sandhurst, leaving here about 7 am, who could offer a lift to a Rye lad on Mondays, Wednesdays, Thursdays and Fridays? If so, please ring.
• The week's planning list has an application to construct a bathroom and dressing-room at first-floor level above an existing single-storey building at Little Orchard in West Street; and a request for change of use for the Windmill guest house in Ferry Road, to a registered home for the elderly.
THE RYE GAZETTE is registered as a newspaper with the Post Office, published by Mrs. Mary Owen, 2 Cyprus Place, Rye, East Sussex, TN31 7DR (0797 222303), and printed by Cinque Ports Stationers of Rye. Deadline is Monday afternoon for each Wednesday's delivery to subscribers/pick-up points; subscriptions are payable in advance on the basis of 30p an issue. Spare copies are sometimes available, from Cyprus Place only. (Copyright Mary Owen 1987)